Overwatch’s Director Talks About Speaking To Fans, And How It Affects His Team

While making a video game is a daunting effort that comes with its share of rewards, it also comes with a number of setbacks – including the people that play them.

Granted, fans are usually supportive of a game, but their feedback can also weigh down on a team, especially if that means more work with patches, fixes and having to try things to flush out the negative. That’s exactly what Overwatch‘s squad seems to go through.

A fan went to the Blizzard forums recently, asking, “Now I get it the devs have to choose their words carefully and can’t respond to ever (question),” and referring to the lack of “blue posts” from staff. “Even large collective threads with hundreds of posts on one topic, or dozens of threads on the same question be ignored.”

And that prompted game director Jeff Kaplan to write a hearty blog post about the team’s dedication, even without the “blue posts”. He noted, “Since the day we have launched, we’ve only increased our efforts and dedication.”

He then added the following regarding “blue posts” in general. “And if you’ll allow me to speak openly for a moment — it’s scary. Overall, the community is awesome to us. But there are some pretty mean people out there. All of our developers are free to post on these forums. Very few of us actually do because it’s extremely intimidating and/or time consuming. It’s very easy to post the wrong thing and make a “promise” to the community that no one intended to make. Once we say we’re working on something, we’re not allowed to ‘take it back’. It’s set in stone.

“Also, because we are open with you and do not hide behind an anonymous handle (like all of you have the luxury of doing), we often times get personally attacked and threatened.

“Most great developers I know just love being head’s down making or playing games. The ‘public speaking/posting’ part of the job is downright scary and intimidating. It often feels like there is no winning.”

So there’s a lot of thought that goes into comments, fixes and what-not, and it’s not as easy as it looks.

Overwatch is available now for Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC.